"Troy Denning - Dark Sun - Prism Pentad 04 - Obsidian Oracle" - читать интересную книгу автора (Denning Troy)

THE OBSIDIAN ORACLE
TROY DENNING
Dark Sun, Prism Pentad, Book 4
First Printing: June 1993.
Printed in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 92-61089
ISBN: 1-56076-603-4

Scanned, formatted and proofed by Dreamcity
Ebook version 1.0
Release Date: December, 1, 2003


Dedication: For Michael T. Griebling, never forgotten.

Acknowledgements:
Many people contributed to the writing of this book and the creation of the series. I would like to thank you all
Without the efforts of the following people, especially, Athas might never have seen the light of the crimson sun:
Mary Kirchoff and Tim Brown, who shaped the world as much as anyone, Brom, who gave us the look and the feel,
Jim Lowder, for his inspiration aid patience, Lloyd Holden of the AKF Martial Arts Academy in Janesville, WI, for
contributing his expertise to the fight scenes, Andria Hayday, for support and encouragement, and Jim Ward, for
enthusiasm, support, and much more.
PROLOGUE
Out of the corner of her eye, Neeva glimpsed the crimson flash of a sun-spell. Despite the impending victory of
her militia, she felt the cold hand of panic dosing around her heart. The flare had come from the direction of the
Sunbird Gate, which guarded all the hidden treasures of the village-most especially her young son, Rkard.
To her dismay, Neeva was in no position to rush to his aid. She stood atop the mountainous shell of a dead
mekillot, using nothing more than a pair of short swords to fight three men armed with lances and daggers. In the
narrow streets of Kled, her militiamen were mercilessly butchering the raiders who had come to take slaves from
their village. The few invaders who escaped the dwarves' bloody axes were fleeing toward one of the many breaches
in the town wall, opened at the start of the assault by the mighty reptile upon which Neeva now stood. Considering
the speed with which the slavers had struck, the battle was going extremely well, but that did little to cheer the
worried mother.
"Enough of this!" Neeva growled, hurling one of her swords at the nearest attacker.
The steel blade split the man's sternum with a muted crack and sank deep into his chest. The militia commander
did not wait to see him fall. Instead, she dropped to a knee and spun, extending her other leg to its full length. As the
next slaver stepped forward to attack her back, Neeva's ankle smashed into his knee and swept him off his feet. She
continued her spin, slicing the man's throat before he hit the ground. The third slaver's lance came darting for her
breast. She batted the point aside with her free hand, then drove her sword deep into the man's stomach.
Neeva freed her swords from the bodies of the dying slavers, hardly hearing their groans of agony. Her eyes
were already searching the streets for her husband, hoping Caelum had been the one who had cast the sun-spell at the
Sunbird Gate. She found him on the opposite side of the village, too far away to have caused the flash.
Confident that her militia could finish routing the slavers without her direction, Neeva slid down the mekillot
shell. She scrambled over the rubble of several crushed huts, then slipped into a narrow street and ran for the Sunbird
Gate. Twice, she paused to kill panicked raiders who stumbled across her path, but, in her hurry to reach the gate, she
allowed several more to escape.
Fifty yards from her destination, she glimpsed a trio of inixes scurrying down a parallel street, their serpentine
tails whipping from side to side and smashing holes into the stone huts that lined the avenue. The lizards were about
fifteen feet long, with ash-colored scales, stocky legs, and beaks of bone that could bite a woman in two. On the
shoulders of each beast sat a lance-bearing driver, while cargo how-dahs, huge boxes made of sunbleached bone,